Most PC cases sold today don't have any provision for directly mounting a 3.5" device in the front panel. Floppy drives are a thing of the distant past, and most accessory units designed for mounting in this location have adopted the 5.25" format. The Patriot Convoy 425XL takes advantage of this larger environment to provide space for four 2.5" format drives. It's ideally suited for an application where a RAID solution is needed in a small space, particularly the higher RAID levels that require 3-4 drives for a combination of speed and redundancy. Commonly called "laptop" drives, the smaller format is also the most common platform for SSDs. There has been an explosion in the last two years of 2.5" SSSDs on the market; silent and fast, with low power requirements, they would seem to be an ideal companion for this new class of drive enclosure. Benchmark Reviews takes a look at the ins and outs of the Convoy 425XL and then puts it through its paces with a full suite of benchmarking tests.

Over the past several years, OCZ have transformed themselves from an enthusiast system memory brand into a recognized name for high-performance storage devices. They've earned consumer praise for their ability to deliver Solid State Drive technology at a reasonable price, and they push the boundaries with their High Speed Data Link project. There's a solid middle ground between SATA and HSDL, and that's the PCI Express bus. Not long ago Benchmark Reviews tested the SandForce-driven OCZ RevoDrive, and now we're back with the high-level version of that product: OCZ RevoDrive X2. Now using four SF1200 SSDs in RAID-0, the RevoDrive X2 series is capable of up to 120,000 IOPS at speeds up to 740 MB/s.

Hard drive capacities are expanding so fast it is easy to think, "Who actually uses a whole terabyte!?" But as storage space increases, so does the demand for fatter content. Managing even a gigabyte of files can be a cumbersome task, just imagine what it will be like to corral 1000 times that many files. "Where did that file just get saved?" To address this growing problem Hitachi Global Storage Technologies has evolved the portable hard drive by marrying the hardware with built-in content management software. Benchmark Reviews got hold of a 500 GB version of one of these new drives. Model HLSMPUA5001ABB is part of the LifeStudio Mobile Plus series and geared towards small and large storage portability. Benchmark Reviews will analyze this new breed of storage technology to see what the LifeStudio line has to offer.

Storage standards and bandwidth aside, it's understandable why SSDs were developed on a drive profile first: notebook and desktop hard disk drive upgrades offered a tremendous user-base. Unfortunately, SSDs were introduced with premium prices that rendered many consumers numb with sticker shock. As the technology became more prevalent, prices have also become more affordable and power-users have embraced the performance SSDs are known to offer. Now the market is ready for the next step: high-performance PCI-Express SSDs built for hardware enthusiasts. Enter the OCZ RevoDrive PCI-E SSD. In this article, Benchmark Reviews tests the 120GB OCZ RevoDrive SSD (model OCZSSDPX-1RVD0120) against the fastest storage solutions on the market.

USB 3.0, aka "SuperSpeed USB", is finally out, and it brings massively improved throughput and performance over USB 2.0. At 4.8Gbps, it's ten times faster than USB 2.0's maximum of 480Mbps. The only problem is that very few devices are available with USB 3.0 interfaces. Patriot's "Gauntlet" external drive enclosure is one such, and Benchmark Reviews checks out the Patriot Gauntlet SuperSpeed USB Edition PCGT25S external drive enclosure with an OCZ Vertext Turbo 120G SSD to see how its performance compares with USB 2.0 speeds as well as a direct SATA connection.

OCZ Technology has once again brought cutting-edge high-speed SSDs into the value storage segment with their Agility 2 series. Based on the SandForce SF1200 controller, the OCZ Agility 2 SSD delivers up to 20,000 IOPS with incredible bandwidth speed. In this article, Benchmark Reviews tests the 120GB OCZ Agility 2 Extended OCZSSD2-2AGTE120G against some of the fastest storage solutions on the market. Just when PCs were starting to seem irrelevant in this fast-paced world of mobile gadgets and smart phones, along comes a new product that changes the entire landscape. SSDs, or more formally Solid State Drives, have finally lifted computers beyond the age of spinning metal magnetic platters. Delivering a boost in speed that no memory upgrade or new processor could ever dream of, solid state drive technology has sent hard disk drives packing.

Just when PCs were starting to seem irrelevant in this fast-paced world of mobile gadgets and smart phones, along comes a new product that changes the entire landscape. SSDs, or more formally Solid State Drives, have finally lifted computers beyond the age of spinning metal magnetic platters. Delivering a boost in speed that no memory upgrade or new processor could ever dream of, solid state drive technology has sent hard disk drives packing. OCZ Technology, an enthusiast memory company and pioneer of consumer SSD products, further commits to their passion for high-speed storage and delivers the OCZ Vertex 2. Based on the SandForce SF1200 controller, the OCZ Vertex 2 Extended SSD delivers up to 50,000 IOPS with incredible bandwidth speed. In this article, Benchmark Reviews tests the 120GB OCZ Vertex 2 Extended OCZSSD2-2VTXE120G against some of the fastest storage solutions on the market.

Solid State Drive storage devices have become the hot ticket for high-performance computer enthusiasts. Impartial towards either PC, Linux, or Apple platforms, SSDs have the power to transform slow computers into blazing-fast speed machines. The SandForce SF-1200 has quickly become the de facto SSD controller for companies seeking recognition, and for good reason. The G.Skill Phoenix Pro embraces the SF-1222TA3-SBH processor to produce up to 50,000 IOPS with only 7% over-provisioning to generate maximum performance with optimal capacity. In this article, Benchmark Reviews tests the 60GB G.Skill Phoenix Pro SSD FM-25S2S-60GBP2 against some of the fastest storage solutions on the market.

Corsair is known for their high end memory products, many of which cater solely to the enthusiast and overclocking crowds. The Corsair Reactor SSD CSSD-R60GB2-BRKT is an Entry Level Solid State Drive claiming to offer good performance for a decent price. Corsair used the JMicron JMF612 in the Reactor series which JMicron claims is the answer to the stuttering the original JMF601 and JMF602 controllers have. In this article, Benchmark reviews is going to to see if the Corsair Reactor R60 can keep up with the other SSD's on the market.